We’ve written about Joe Mercola’s support for quackery on this blog several times (for instance, here and here). It’s good to see that some of the mainstream media are starting to take notice, as evidenced by this article by Bryan Smith for Chicago Magazine entitled Dr. Mercola: Visionary or Quack? It features comments from a couple of—shall we say?—familiar people.

Although this article did irk me a bit for its tendency to buy into the false “tell both sides” balance, even going so far as to claim that much of what’s on Mercola’s website is actually based in science, I do think it is nonetheless very useful in that it demonstrates just how powerful and influential Mercola has become:

According to traffic-tracking firm Quantcast, Mercola.com draws about 1.9 million unique visitors per month, each of whom returns an average of nearly ten times a month. That remarkable “stickiness” puts the site’s total visits on a par with those to the National Institutes of Health’s website. (Mercola claims his is “the world’s No. 1 natural health website,” citing figures from Alexa.com.) Mercola’s 200,000-plus “likes” on Facebook are more than double the number for WebMD. And two of his eight books—2003’s The No-Grain Diet and 2006’s The Great Bird Flu Hoax—have landed on the New York Times bestseller list.

What a depressing thought that Mercola.com draws about the same traffic as the NIH website!
I also now know where Barbara Loe Fisher and her antivaccine group the National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) got all that money to run ads in AMC Theaters during Thanksgiving weekend 2010, ads on the CBS Jumbotron in Times Square last spring, and, most recently, to buy ads with the company that supplies Delta Airlines with its in-flight video content:

Mercola says he recently donated $1 million to several alternative medicine groups, including the National Vaccine Information Center, which describes itself as a “vaccine watch dog.” Part of the money, according to the group’s website, was used to pay for an ad called “Vaccines: Know the Risk,” which was shown hourly on the CBS Jumbotron in Times Square for several weeks last spring.

Mercola says he is simply trying to ask hard questions about the potential harm caused by inoculations and voice his opposition to government-imposed mandates. “There are virtually no safety studies done [on vaccines],” Mercola says. “We don’t know what the effects of combining them are. We don’t know what the long-term complications are.” He says the government and media downplay very real risks and either underreport or ignore serious adverse reactions. Meanwhile, “we don’t have the option to say no [to getting the shots]. It’s just insane what’s happening, and more and more vaccines [are coming] down the line.”

The NVIC has never exactly been particularly flush with cash, but apparently Mercola has changed all that. What I’d really like to know is what other alt-med organizations were beneficiaries of Mercola’s largesse.

What I also now know is that Joe Mercola is rich, as in filthy rich, as in “rolling in the dough” rich, as in “raking it in hand over fist rich.” After all, he had a spare $1 million lying around to give away to the NVIC and various other quackery-promoting groups.

Finally, I know what really matters to Mercola. (Hint: It’s not patient care.) To whit:

If there were any doubt about the importance of marketing to the operation, it was dispelled when I was given a quick tour of Mercola’s sprawling headquarters. The lobby of Dr. Mercola’s Natural Health Center looks like the kind of well-appointed suburban office where you’d expect vanity procedures such as face-lifts to be offered. As it turns out, only one short hallway is dedicated to patient services. “Marketing and customer service take up most of the rest,” a new-patient coordinator told me.

Based on what I know about Mercola, that sounds about right. One little section of his empire devoted to actual patient care, the rest all devoted to marketing and fulfilling online orders. That’s very telling and entirely consistent with Mercola’s behavior. He might have been a real doctor at one time, but in 2012 he exists only to enrich himself by selling a mixture of the unremarkable, the unproven, and what I consider to be quackery. Certainly the archive of articles on his website is a treasure trove of quackery, antivaccine rants, quack apologia, and rants against the government and big pharma, interspersed with videos and radio interviews, and more. Truly, it’s a multimedia empire of woo. In my opinion, of course.

211 thoughts on “Joe Mercola: Quackery pays”

One large point you have missed is that the Mercola site gives out a lot of free advice that is much more useful than the NIH site, staying well requires a commitment to understanding what that means not just fire fighting symptoms as they occur. 1.9 million people can’t be wrong, perhaps people are fed up with the idea that experts are the only people we need to crisis manage disease.

What’s wrong with being rich from providing a useful public service?

I mean who says the whole swine flu scam wasnt a pandemic of woo, every person I met thought it was complete bull and the NIH promoted this scare story on the level of world terrorism!

Exactly how is it that you determine that his free information is useful or accurate? I can’t even begin to understand how you could quantify the statement of his site being more useful than the NIH web-site. I hate to rain on your parade here, but 1.9 million people certainly could be wrong…or at least misinformed. What you don’t understand is that this whole “you don’t need to rely on experts, you can heal yourself…naturally” is nothing more than a marketing gimmick to make you feel empowered and, in turn, buy more garbage from the promoters of such non-sense. Both Mercola and Pharmaceutical companies are for-profit organizations that aim to make money. Don’t you at least want the option that has a process in place to demonstrate safety and efficacy? Referring to Mercola as “providing a useful public service” is as naive as I’ve heard. What he is doing, is misleading the public and exploiting the ignorance of the general public. “you don’t need experts, trust me” and you buy it hook, line and sinker. How many people do you know that are experts on infectious disease? Or is there some other reason to think that “every person you met…” had any idea what they were talking about regarding Swine Flu? Had a real pandemic occurred, you would be thanking your lucky stars that we had these organizations to, as best as they can, prepare us for the worst case scenario. The flu doesn’t go pandemic (again, it could have) and you honestly have the audacity to sit here and call it fear mongering and overreacting? That can be a very easy thing to say when we just happen to not have a large death toll. What people like this lack is perspective….the larger picture is not even on their radar.

The swine flu scamdemic you could say was pretty recent. Mercola was consistantly spot on about this big myth and that’s a good enough gold star for anyone. On the other hand the CDC NIH and just about every govenment apart from Poland got it completely wrong.

Well all the experts in the CDC NIH had less awareness than the average man on the street, where did you learn this idea that the bigger the expert the more right they are? Did you seriously buy the pandemic tale Chaos, I am sorry to point the finger but if you came to my bar you’d be laughed at. I find it difficult to believe I have actually met someone who believed in the pandemic, did you honestly sit at home watching tv all day and crapping it?

If that’s the best they can do its a good example of what to completely avoid, I mean in England 40 years of study by the national cold and flu unit, government dept, failed to proove the contagen theory of flu so it got shut down.

The origional pandemic was aspirin inspired, you need to read a bit wider than pubmed.

have a go at this litmus test. read through mercola’s site. note how many times he references only himself. note how many and of what kind he utilizes as sources that constitute actual peer review (not simply other blog entries) – his work is “science based” after all, correct? look at those references, what do they have to do with what he is saying?

the thing in which you would be engaging, is actual skeptical investigation. right now you are telling us “chocolate is better than vanilla..so there.”

“mercola said mercola was right and all the people agree” should alarm you at least a little…

You quote peer review as if it was some kind of Chiltern rite. What is this magical approval process that is all truth? Mercola quotes sources and research all over the place so you must have selective vision Eric, maybe you should try some supplementation?

Come on Eric, as the only person I have conversed with who actually believed in the pandemic tell me what made you believe all that CDC nonsense, I am fascinated with your process here. You are not really coming across all that skeptical Eric, more fanatical. Unable to even see logical critique, who taught you not to think?

The EBM shows us that flu as a concept is bull. Mercola happens to agree, why would I log on to NIH for advice when most of its articles are some kind of relgious clap trap?

Why cant you let go? Tell me is Skeptical with a K different to sceptical with a C?

ah the sensible logic employed by assuming my thoughts and attitudes – not too sparingly peppered with insult, ramble and rhetorical questions. It comes as no wonder to me that no one here has wasted their time in the non-discussion you wish to have. i wonder if you thought, that by calling an individual a fanatic (as well as unthinking, credulous and dogmatic) despite nothing uttered of the sort, you would chance upon a friendly discussion aimed at mutual edification?

Flu, as a concept, is bull? Wow…you have to be a troll, right? I can’t imagine you typing that with a straight face. I don’t sit at home and watch tv and buy everything that’s fed to me. What I do understand is the extremely difficult situation that organizations like the CDC are in trying to be prepared, but not over do it. Sarah007, you confuse skepticism with conspiracy theory. If all the overhype was intentional then to what end? What was the goal of the CDC in creating panic that they “knew” wasn’t warranted? Let me guess….money. They were trying to boost the profits of there bed-fellows, the pharmaceutical companies? I don’t suppose you have a shred of evidence to support your claims? Is this really what your calling skepticism? It’s always the same with the conspiracy nuts……”I’m just asking questions, I’m just being skeptical”, when in reality….they are relying on poor evidence, anomaly hunting and jumping from one wild conclusion to another. The idea that trying to accurately predict the evolution and spread of something like the flu, any flu…is extremely difficult is realistic and backed by evidence. Again, if you want to fault them for overdoing it, then be my guest. I personally would rather they side with caution. But you don’t really care about reality, do you? None of you conspiracy types do. Had they given little attention to it and more dies, then you would be crying cover-up! “They knew and didn’t tell us!” At the end of the day you may be left with the most provocative and interesting view point, but for those of us that care about reality, we need not these things. You can go back to Mercola and Alex Jones and let them know that reality sends it’s regards…..it misses them.

Mercola is wrong on several things, such As the A&D ratios being problematic in cod liver oil and Krill being a sustainable, better source of Omega’s than fish, and my favorite comparing the absorprtion of D3 on furry mammals compared to humans as a reason for us not to take showers after sun bathing. Joe is luck that he was right about the pandemic.

I am reminded of something Nassim Taleb wrote in, I think, “The Black Swan.” Suppose a senator pushed through legislation making cockpits totally inaccessible to passengers and other crew while in flight despite protests by airlines. The legislation went into effect on 9-10-01. 9/11 never had a chance to happen. The senator go voted out for needlessly raising the costs of air travel.

“If that’s the best they can do its a good example of what to completely avoid, I mean in England 40 years of study by the national cold and flu unit, government dept, failed to proove the contagen theory of flu so it got shut down.

The origional pandemic was aspirin inspired, you need to read a bit wider than pubmed.”

Do you have any kind of source for the claim that the contagion theory of flu can’t be proven?

and on your second point, are you perhaps referring to the Starko article that proposed that part of the death rate from the 1918 pandemic was caused by overuse of aspirin? If so you should note that her conclusions have hardly been shown to be conclusive or applicable to many areas affected by the pandemic.

Chaos, the point is there was no evidence of anything about to kick off, and it didn’t. We now know all the preparations like anti virals were useless, the vaccines didn’t work and a lot of people were made ill. Oh I forgot all the Tamiflu data was lost by Roche when peer reviewed journals asked for it to do a post scamdemic audit, how convenient, that’s not a conspiracy it’s creative accounting, too big to fail.

So these marvellous experts at the CDC not only got it wrong they came up with a crap solution to nothing. It’s not a conspiracy Chaos, its bull. To cap it all the taxpayer undwrote the failure and paid for it. Where is your head, what on earth are you reading? Are you seriously believing in all this, I’m amazed.

I don’t know anyone who had a vaccine, I don’t know anyone who believed it either, I am fascinated that there is a community of people here who seem to think the lurgy might get them, that health is good luck, it’s so superstitious.

Harriet there you go again with the whole studying and learning and being tested as to show you understand that which you talk about. Why would anybody devote themselves to studying one area and being an expert on that subject. Better stick ones thumbs in their ears, stick out their tongue and wonder why all the scientists have funny Oriental names then it is to engage ones thinking box in critical thinking skills.

I love how Mercola is described here. There is a list of things that Mercola has claimed to cause autism:

Pasteurized milk
Fluoride
Aluminum (one wonders how Mercola gets food grown in soil that does not contain feldspars)
Mercury (of course)
MMR (of course), and I am curious if this was noticed in 1971 when it was introduced in the USA
Malnutrition
Lactose
Glutamine

By the way, I noticed that around three dozen people were sickened by raw milk from Pennsylvania. Well that sounds like a ringing endorsement of germ theory denial!

Ah The condecending all powerful down nose glancing, ignorance of oppotunities to squeeze out of the anti/ pro distraction and look at the science. You know it is totally unscientific to polarise this into pro/anti, it forces the proers to cling onto the belief vaccines work when the rest of the modern world has woken up and realised the peer review approval process is nose diving into the pit. It is so desperate it is lobbying for mandatory legislation. If you look back at history Eric you will see that mandatory vaccine laws have been repealed just before for the same reasons some countries prefer to leave the choice to parents.

I don’t doubt your sincerity at all Eric, but you are misinformed, looking at selective science and wrong.

Bgoudie it shut down because it was unable to make more than 11% of people react to having virus sprayed up the nose, that’s half of placebo which is quite interesting really, maybe flu virus keeps you well? Isolating the virus did nothing for the unit, if this woo theory worked he would have made millions, better to shut the unit rather than risk the woo of flu getting out heh.

From David Tyrell’s obituary in the Lancet, June 2005:

The UK’s Common Cold Research Unit (later the Common Cold Unit), in Salisbury, came into being after World War II when Harvard University donated a wartime hospital it had set up for the British military. In 1957, David Tyrrell, who had worked at the Rockefeller Institute in New York, USA, and at the then-infant UK’s Medical Research Council but was still a “reluctant young virologist”, as he would later describe himself, became head of the unit. He took over what was planned as a last-ditch effort to culture the virus responsible for the common cold to forestall the closure of the unit.

The assignment, scheduled to last 3 years, paid off in 1960 with the publication of three papers describing common cold virus isolates in The Lancet. The Common Cold Unit lasted until 1990, when it was shut down…

The Common Cold Unit was well-known for its uses of volunteers, some 20 000 of whom spent days or weeks taking part in trials after responding to advertisements such as “Free 10 Day Autumn or Winter Break: You May Not Win A Nobel Prize, But You Could Help Find a Cure for the Common Cold.” A character in Iris Murdoch’s Under the Net met another character through volunteering there.

Purina, you are right better to dump a data scattergun than wake up and realise one is a dupe for buying into the flu protection scam, how distressing that must be. It’s a scientology tactic, if I am logical, she is illogical, if I am illogical she is logical. It’s also called believer syndrome, she just can’t engage with a belief system challenge.

Nice to see such a solid engagement in discussion, the fatherly nod of approval, nothing going on elsewhere? So I am interested, do you have a yearly flu shot and what do you think of the pandemic scam?

I am amazed at your lack of scientific enquiry Harriet. If I won’t believe your bible but want to question it you will not discuss anything at all! If I show you research that shows you your position is not sustainable you refuse to even comment on it, even though it has been published by your church!

This skeptical thang is wierd beard, the earth is not flat and you need to start reading more.

So lets get this right Harriet. Vaccines are supposed to stimulate antibody production to protect us. The flu jab apparently does provoke an antibody immune response along with all the cellular detritus and aluminium etc. but the problem is current peer reviewed EBM shows us it makes no difference to hospital admissions whatsoever.

So is the theory crap, and it is only a theory, or is the process of application crap or is the whole caboodle crap, which one is it.

I can’t stop laughing, you have no idea what you have brought into and you are still defending it like some religious nutter and JPZee agrees too, what exactly does he agree with? Harriet is even pround she went along like a sheep and let them do it!

Do you have a reference? I thought you didn’t buy into the expert thing. Why would you need peer reviewed EBM anyway? Are the peers morons like you and Mercola? Or the ones in the next stall when you go to the loo?

Logic stands on its own. It is not dependant on the topic at hand. You seem to have an unwillingness to admit that you are, indeed, a conspiracy loon. As such, you are using the same sort of anomaly hunting and broken logic that 9/11 truthers use. The effectiveness of vaccines overall, is well established. Flu’s are difficult to pin down because they are ever evolving and researches are forced to make certain educated guesses on what it will look like next year. Consequently, for seasonal flu, some years the flu shot if more effective than others. Again, if you understand logic, as you claim too, then just show us the goods. Your challenging the established reality with, what amounts to, some kind of ideological basis and you have yet to provide a single shred of compelling evidence to make your point. Your failure to do so clearly demonstrates that you are coming from a place of emotion and cognitive dissonance…..not logic, science, or anything approaching reality. At the end of the day, I don’t think you care about truth. To you it’s about standing your ground and deluding yourself into thinking that you and mercola know. You know what most don’t, you have special knowledge and the other sheeple just march to whatever drum beat is playing. It’s like mental masturbation for you people. Delusions of self-worth and intellect.

You know it is totally unscientific to polarise this into pro/anti, it forces the proers to cling onto the belief vaccines work when the rest of the modern world has woken up and realised the peer review approval process is nose diving into the pit.

Sarah007, you seem to think that one study that you agree with is enough to knock down all the rest that you don’t agree with. It doesn’t work that way. Especially since it was only one section of the population (chronically ill patients).

It would also help if you learned to cite properly.

I gave a list of things Mercola thinks cause autism, which one of those is the real reason?

Quite remarkable really, no wonder orthodox medicine is in the shit with this kind of debate going on. I mean what can’t you read about flu vaccine being ineffective, pandemic not happening!

So Nybgrus did you fall for the flu jab scam or did you leave it out. I can’t believe I have found so many of you all huddled together waiting for the next CDC output, all that EBC to catch up on its really funny.

So for the third time posting it, can you even dare to read it Chris and Ngborg?

@ Sarah007
Everyone is ignoring it because it is clear, just from the title, that this study in no way demonstrates your conspiracy claim. How does a single study looking at a very specific subset of the population (those with underlying chronic diseases) in any way support your claim that vaccines are a scam? The fact that you take a study like this and what you take away from it is that vaccines are a scam is a clear demonstration of your ideological motivations, broken logic and general lack or real critical thinking. You want people to take you seriously, then how about some compelling evidence for the claim that your actually making?

In case anyone missed it on the other thread, I’ll repeat my comment here:
Sarah,
We are not ignoring your “evidence.” We read the study you cited. One study about one outcome of one flu vaccine in one select group of patients weighs practically nothing in the context of all the other published evidence. Part of the conclusions of that study even contradicts your beliefs: It didn’t significantly reduce hospitalizations, but “Among chronically ill people, this vaccine offered protection against laboratory confirmed H1N1 infection.”
We don’t give flu vaccines for the sole purpose of reducing hospitalizations in people with chronic disease. We give them to prevent suffering and in the hopes of reducing the spread of the disease.

How many children and adults worldwide, would have to die, before you and Mercola would give the WHO and the CDC your approval to start the manufacturing process for the seasonal flu vaccine of the H1N1 vaccine?

Isn’t it far better to do the research, manufacture, license and offer the H1N1 Flu vaccine to children and other vulnerable populations, using epidemiological data from Mexico where the H1N1 pandemic began? Or, would you rather we wait until the following seasonal flu season to incorporate that strain into seasonal flu vaccine? It seems to me that your hero Dr. Mercola knows nothing about immunology or antigenic shifts of the virus.

The tragedy is that Mercola has used the tragic deaths of children from H1N1 flu as more misinformation to impress his credulous sycophants and to sell his “brand”.

You beat me to it. 49% effectiveness in preventing the flu in this population. Not the greatest, but still effective. It looks like hospitalizations weren’t decreased significantly. Not surprisingly, Sarah007 doesn’t know how to read studies.

How many children and adults worldwide, would have to die, before you and Mercola would give the WHO and the CDC your approval to start the manufacturing process for the seasonal flu vaccine OR the H1N1 vaccine?

So “hope” is now a medical term, I thought you had the science to back it up. You know I came here to see what happens if you point out the obvious, what I find is a hysterical non science response. The cochraine review of the flu jab looked at many of the claims made by advocates of the vaccine and found none of the claims could be supported. One claim made is that the flu vaccine halves winter deaths. It found that only 10% of winter deaths can be attributed to flu like illnesses so to halve winter deaths the vaccine would have to have an impact on road traffic accidents. Vaccinating helpers in old peoples homes protects old people, again no evidence of efficacy, the list is far longer than I can be bothered to type here. In fact the latter scotches the myth of herd immunity. The US has probably the highest vaccine compliance in the Western World but

It is disturbing that this site claims some kind of scientific basis for critique, polarising the vaccine issue into pro or anti means you are forced to support it even when the evidence does not exist, that is not scientific at all it is religious fervor.

Why does there need to be two studies saying the flu vaccine is bull? Again I don’t know anyone who has it and I don’t see flu kicking off unrestrained. As the national cold and flu unit found if you cannot make a cohort of volunteers ‘catch’ flu by spraying flu virus up their nose how the hell do you argue for it ‘going around’.

I have been unable to find any citation of the claim that the CCU was unable to get more than 11% of subjects to react to having cold viruses sprayed up their nose.

I did find the following in an article on the development of cold vaccines British Medical Journal Vol 62 issue 1, pp 99-111. In the section discussing human parainfluenza viruses, specifically PIV3 one vaccine candidate was “was safe, immunogenic, and genetically stable in seronegative infants. However, only 11% of seropositive children developed a 4-fold increase in haemagglutinin titres and only 22% acquired nasal IgA antibodies.”

If this the source of your claim, it appears to have been rather broadly applied to a situation quite separate from the actual data.

The common cold unit was responsible for the isolation of several of the viruses responsible for colds and influenza. There’s the rub of the entire “cure for the common cold” as the concept is viewed by most of the public. The cold isn’t one thing, its simply a designation for a wide range illnesses caused by a large number of viruses. Viruses that have a habit of constant alteration and mutation. Each one has to be dealt with in turn and so must the changes in its descendants.

I’m not sure what you were trying say in your collection of quotes from a very short and imcomplete obituary.

Banana equals frog spawn. What kind of science is this then? What does the autism rate have to reach before the CDC and NIH admit there is a problem? How many people have to die from Vioxx a licensed RCT EBM drug before the FDA pull it, answer 160,000. That’s how many died before profits were overtaken by payouts.

Considering the flu vaccine has done nothing to prevent anything except good health the question you ask is complete bonkers.

So David have you added up the accumilation of mercury in your seasonal flu shots and worked out how toxic you must be, here is a list does any of it ring a bell? I will have a look and get back.

What does the autism rate have to reach before the CDC and NIH admit there is a problem?

Given that there is no relation between the autism rate (which is, as far as we can tell, stable – as distinct from autism diagnosis rate), no rate of autism would lead to any admission of a problem related to vaccines. Evidence that there’s some relationship is what would be needed.

How many people have to die from Vioxx a licensed RCT EBM drug before the FDA pull it, answer 160,000.

[citation needed] Most estimates are less than half that. Irrelevant to the point anyway.

Considering the flu vaccine has done nothing to prevent anything except good health the question you ask is complete bonkers.

Considering that even your own reference shows that it does prevent getting the flu with reasonable efficacy, you’re the one who is completely bonkers.

So David have you added up the accumilation of mercury in your seasonal flu shots and worked out how toxic you must be, here is a list does any of it ring a bell?

It seem that Sarah007 is in the minority here. Hardly surprising; she doesn’t have the critical thinking skills to differentiate between the advice and opinions of a quack and the real science as seen on the various NIH web sites.

Mercola has been promoting his pseudoscience for years. His AIDS denialism should have turned Sarah007 against him…but yet she hangs in, for his “valuable free advice” which is steeped in woo, about vaccines, about cancer and about diet and health.

Mercola is rolling in riches, thanks to the collective ignorance of his audience, who buy into his pseudoscience, his conspiracies, his quackery and his selling of potions, lotions, vitamins, supplements, “organic” food, cookware, bakeware, and tanning beds.

You’re missing the fundamental point of both Dr. Gorski’s article and this entire website. For us to support a claim it must be grounded in evidence. In order to recognize the difference between evidence and baloney you need to have at least a basic understanding of how the scientific method works. In other words once you’re able to appreciate why physiology textbooks have a chapter on osmosis but not “chi” I’m confident you’ll be able to make a meaningful contribution to these discussions.

Like your comment Ladyboy, In the minority on a minor blog in nowhere land where a pile of anonymous saddos rant that no one is listening to them!

I’m quite proud of that. It is so funny that there is a very very little group of ‘people’ who believe in the NIH and the CDC and flu vaccine! How critical is that ladyboy?

I think what I have seen here is a lot of people very pissed that your opinions are not valid by others, well judged by your popularity. I mean who ever found anything interesting to read on WebMD! That’s like subscribing to ‘hernia monthly’ what kind of geekos/gorkos log in for a great read there?

Piles of ‘you’re all going to die’ or ‘weekly announcements of fake cancer cures’ someone needs to adjust your target boys because you’re about as scientific as the muppets. Bring on the frog.

At least we can all sleep safe in our beds knowing that dorks stupid enough to believe that a shot of jet trash and cellular detritis grown on a chickens egg and mixed with toxic waste will via their own population bias natural selection not be around long enough to make any impact. So get used to being small and ignored. I’m off to order some vitamin C from Mr Mercola.

Mercola’s 200,000-plus “likes” on Facebook are more than double the number for WebMD. And two of his eight books—2003’s The No-Grain Diet and 2006’s The Great Bird Flu Hoax—have landed on the New York Times bestseller list.

“Mercola’s 200,000-plus “likes” on Facebook are more than double the number for WebMD. And two of his eight books—2003’s The No-Grain Diet and 2006’s The Great Bird Flu Hoax—have landed on the New York Times bestseller list.”

@ Cowy 1: Thanks for the link to Quackwatch…which has been updated with additional information about “Health Liberty”, a coalition of crank pseudoscience organizations. Having worked in public health and actually investigated cases of listeriosis and other serious transmissible diseases caused by consuming unpasteurized milk and cheeses, I am especially concerned with the group he is funding that advocates consumption of unpasteurized milk:

I don’t want to comment on any oft the previous postings, however there is indeed some important information missing in this discussion about influenza vaccination and its efficacy. Has anyone consulted the Cochrane Library regarding the efficacy of influenza vaccination, yet?

The study design used in Cochrane reviews, a systematic review of all relevant randomized controlled trials, is the highest level of evidence in Evidence Based Medicine (EBM)!

The authors of the systematic review entitled “Vaccines for preventing influenza in healthy adults” conclude:
“The results of this review seem to discourage the utilization of vaccination against influenza in healthy adults as a routine public health measure.”
(…)
„Influenza vaccines have a modest effect in reducing influenza symptoms and working days lost. There is no evidence that they affect complications, such as pneumonia, or transmission.“ (– no herd immunity argument!!)

Finally there is a tiny but very important addendum („warning“) at the end of their review:

„This review includes 15 out of 36 trials funded by industry (four had no funding declaration). An earlier systematic review of 274 influenza vaccine studies published up to 2007 found industry funded studies were published in more prestigious journals and cited more than other studies independently from methodological quality and size. Studies funded from public sources were significantly less likely to report conclusions favorable to the vaccines. The review showed that reliable evidence on influenza vaccines is thin but there is evidence of widespread manipulation of conclusions and spurious notoriety of the studies. The content and conclusions of this review should be interpreted in light of this finding.“

Authors’ conclusion:
(…)“It was surprising to find only one study of inactivated vaccine in children under two years, given current recommendations to vaccinate healthy children from six months old in the USA and Canada. If immunisation in children is to be recommended as a public health policy, large-scale studies assessing important outcomes and directly comparing vaccine types are urgently required.“

Authors’ conclusion:
“The available evidence is of poor quality and provides no guidance regarding the safety, efficacy or effectiveness of influenza vaccines for people aged 65 years or older. To resolve the uncertainty, an adequately powered publicly-funded randomised, placebo-controlled trial run over several seasons should be undertaken.“

Being a healthcare worker I underwent vaccination every year as recommended by so called health authorities until 2010 and had at least one episode of (laboratory proven) influenza, which was very severe regarding symptoms and duration.

Skeptoscience is so weird. So it’s fiine for the NIH and CDC and all the peer reviewed medical journals including as many vaccine companies as one can list to con the whole world into buying into the woo of flu and when someone points this out to the only small corner of the world still hanging onto a medieval ‘medical practice’ all you can do is call me a vampire. Totally brilliant, I can see you all on the Titanic of vaccinology playing in the band telling everyone it’s fiine, you are all AAA star.

This is so much fun.

Brilliant Cowy now you’re inventing stuff from that polarisation crib sheet. Hey Harriet what do you do when people like me get bored with you, do you have mass crotch rub ins with pubmed?

So, if the playing field is level, then you would have answered my question. Which in the list of what Mercola claims causes autism is the actual cause? Support you answer with listing the title, journal and date of the paper you are using as evidence.

Also no good data, but we have every reason to think that if enough people got the flu vaccine, the spread through the community would be decreased, thereby also protecting the elderly and those too young to have been vaccinated or those who refuse vaccination.

The flu vaccine is nowhere near as effective as we would wish, but the science-based answer is that the benefits outweigh the risks.

If you go to the original article in Chicago magazine and read the comments, you’ll find that they are overwhelmingly in support of Dr. Mercola, including many actual patients who credit him for changing their lives for the better after conventional medicine failed them.

In the words of Don King (of whom NO ONE had anything nice to say),
“It doesn’t matter what they say about you, as long as they use your name.”

Chris did you see the paper that compared symptoms listed on the autistic spectrum that had diagnostic value and the listed symptoms of mercury poisoning and that a direct comparison shows they are almost identical.

Yes, I did. It was a silly paper published in Medical Hypothesis written by people who don’t understand medicine and biology (like Blaxill). And since all pediatric vaccines are available in thimerosal free versions (including half of the influenza vaccine), it is a non-issue.

Now go look up what the word “hypothesis” means.

Answer my question. What on the Mercola’s list of things that cause autism is actually true? Provide the title, journal and date of the real papers to support your answer. Newsflash: it is not mercury, since its removal a decade ago did not change the numbers.

@sara007
I’ve noticed that you’ve failed to provide any actual citations for your claims on the only 11% virus transmission rate. You’ve also failed to support your other claims in regards to the CCU except by putting up semi random snips from an obituary. You’ve argued with vauge claims, insults, and appelas to popularity.

You may need to reconsider what “evidence” actually means.

I think though I’ve figured out your basic logic process here in this analogy.

The goverment has encouraged helmet use. But helmets have failed to prevent all head injuries. Therefore they are not a cure for impact tauma. Therefore helmets do nothing and are simple a lie peddled by the so called safety experts. I know people who haven’t had head injuries. Only sheep could think a helmet is needed to avoid head injuries.

Furthermore some helmets were made with metal. Bullets are made of metal and they do bad things to brains. So helmets must do bad things to brains.

Aah the subtle removal of posts that show the grand bishop of septicism to be a fraud has begun. I can just imagine the crisis meetings that this has taken to show daddy that his minions are with the faith. Is there a relationship between the catholic denial of mercury/vacuumn and the septic denial of mercury/autism?

So I would like your comments on why you think the paper on this site that ‘attempts’ to refute the link between mercury and autism is anything more than ghost written tosh.

This article that attempts to disrupt the relationship between autism and mercury poisoning is nonsense. It is full of “may be” statements. Have you ever met an autistic person who can’t speak, the person who wrote this tosh obviously hasn’t. It is a stunning piece of tabloid dissing, so someone who at post mortem has elevated levels of mercury in the brain can’t be interviewed about their lifetime depression. If that’s evidence then you’re having a laff mate/

“In relatively mild mercurism in persons without characteristic motor or sensory changes, psychiatric symptomatology may be absent, and if present is nonspecific, with findings such as depression, anxiety, and irritability.18–20 There may be impairment of recent memory. Even for individuals with known elevated postmortem levels of mercury in brain, it may be impossible to conclude whether the nonspecific psychiatric findings they demonstrated in life were the result of mercury toxicity.21″

This is even more bonkers, so let’s assume it’s true that mercury causes autism what else could do this, an increase in industrialisation, that’s brilliant but hang on we would all be affected by that and I just don’t see loads of dribbling adults in town with ataxia.

“If, for the sake of discussion, we assume there was a true increase in the occurrence of autism in the 1990s, is exposure to thimerosal the only or the best hypothesis to explain the increase? There have been many changes in life in industrialized countries during the last decades, including changes in many environmental exposures and aspects of medical care that could be considered for their biological plausibility as contributors to autism occurrence or severity.”

This is fantastic, little is known about the impact of Thimerosol (ethyl mercury) so it can’t be a problem!

“A substantial literature describes the neurotoxicity of methyl mercury but relatively little is known about the impact of ethyl mercury on the nervous system, especially with repeated low-dose exposure.”

It must be safe we have no idea what it does, how’s that for septic science!
I can’t be bothered to read any more, it’s total bull, if this is the case for the defence you’re sacked mate.

Hi Conner, thanks for the vote of support but meeting on a floating turd isn’t really the best of places to start other discussions! It would seem that the only point on this site is a non scientific duality perspective, you’re either with it or against.

This has nothing to do with science, it’s about marketing. I am sure some are well intentioned and sincere here but the limited viewpoint is somewhat stiffling. Peer review is about reverting to mean, consensus all the non scientific flat earth stuff that keeps mythology alive and kicking. Add in a few very rich celebs, some politicians and a bit of media and it becomes orthodox.

The papers put up to ‘proove’ points are so full of holes, I suggest you read them and take them to bits and invite as many of your friends as possible to post on as many threads as possible so they have to stay up all night editing it all out! Bit of a drag but someones got to do it and the more the merrier.

Harriet, if you were a scientist you woud be looking for evidence for the discussion on flu vaccine not just efficacy evidence. It shows that you are only interested in proving it works. What exactly is scientific about you? I don’t have to be a murderer to know that it is wrong, any more than I need a degree to tell you that the evidence you are presenting is flawed, corrupt and population biased.

Kids are not getting healthier, nor is society so ‘proper doctors’ are failing to safegaurd anything but their nice cars and pensions.

So if their are no long term studies on the toxicity of ethyl mercury it doesnt mean it’s safe. How on earth do you expect me to take this as some kind of ‘it’s ok fact?’

Sarah007 – you should read The Great Influenza by John M. Barry. You may then realize why infectious disease specialists were so concerned about the appearance of H1N1 as a pandemic influenza strain that year.

Population health is of necessity population based. In time perhaps we will be able to exactly match genetics, epigenetics and current physiology to exact disease strains circulating at the time. Until then however, vaccinations are immensely helpful.

Kids are in fact getting much healthier, particularly since the advent of vaccination. Witness for instance, the precipitous drops in birth rates since more children survive to adulthood, as well as the incredible increases in lifespan over the past century. Claiming kids aren’t getting healthier is just bizarre; the sole exception would be increases in type II diabetes and obesity, and the recommendations from all mainstream medical organizations is the same – eat less, higher quality food and get more exercise. Surely you can’t be blaming doctors for the exercise and eating habits of their patients? A doctor can only recommend exercise, they can’t chase children around with a gun until they lose a pound or two.

I’m a noob poster here Sarah007, but I’ve been a lurker for some time. Anyway…

I’ve been following this particular discussion with some interest, and I’ve been impressed with your well-articulated rebuttals of the numerous hostile critiques directed at you. I’m guessing you’ve done a lot of your own research on immunology—or influenza in particular—as you’ve raised several pertinent questions in my mind.

Personally, I have no medical training whatsoever, and rely solely on the opinions and/or directives of others (hopefully!) competent in that field. But I can say that, contrary to my own GP’s advice, I’ve always refused to have the annual winter ‘flu shots (which were introduced in Australia in the late 60s).

More importantly, I’ve never had the ‘flu during that 40-year period. Which means that I’m yet to be entirely convinced by the overarching acceptance and/or efficacy of annual ‘flu vaccinations (which issue has generated heated debate every one of those years). Please note that I’m only commenting solely from the viewpoint of the rights of each individual as to whether they have the shots or not; I’m not referring to pandemic/epidemic prevention.

I’m also assuming that you have professional expertise in the fields of immunology or microbiology or some similar field. Could you kindly let me know what your academic accreditations are?

ausGeoff, how do you know you didn’t get the flu? Did you have a daily or weekly nasal swab to confirm infection? Or antibody titres to confirm immune response? Or some other way of confirming asymptomatic infection?

On a related note, are you familiar with both the term and specific case of Typhoid Mary?

You would be better off discussing your questions with your own GP. Pay him for his time, though. Since we know it is not 100% effective, what would convince you of the efficacy of the flu vaccine? How would you go about checking out whether it is effective or not?

Sorry William if you studied the papers of the time nothing was isolated as causative of pandemic flu and mass aspirin poisoning was the culprit. There have been many attempts to rewrite history and Barry is a very dull attempt. Considering all if the current virologists were anything to base facts upon the whole lot should be lined up and made to take the medicine. The whole thing is a pile of bullshit and to call vaccination ‘science’ is a disgrace.

Look at the national cold and flu unit England, it was unable to prove the contagen theory of flu with 40 years of spraying this virus stuff up volunteer’s noses. It was connected to Porton Down the medical warfare establishment.

I have seen a funny advert on British TV of a guy sneezing on a bus and lots of furry bugs flying around, this should be referred to the advertising standards, it’s bull.

Typhoid Mary, what an ass of a story that is. When they started swabbing for typhoid everyone had it so then they decided that if you had your gall bladder out you could be let out of prison (they imprisoned anyone who was deemed a carrier with no clinical symptoms). Mary refused to have her gall bladder out so I think she died in prison!

ausGeoff, do you know which on the list of things that Mercola thinks are causes of autism are really the cause? Since pediatric vaccines have been thimerosal free for a decade and autism has not gone away, we can scratch that off the list.

So, do please tell me which in that list is the real reason, with supporting scientific documentation.

Chris the article on mercury states quite clearly that ethyl mercury has no long term toxicity studies so what is an unproven ingredient doing in a vaccine and what evidence do you have that it has been taken out of multivial pediatric vaccines?

I don’t often quote wiki because it has been taken over by systems geeks but the graphs are still there it’s their interpretation that is fantasy.

If you look at the w shaped graph of mortality you will see that the age of maximum mortality was young men between 17 and 34. Modern myth spreaders say this is because the ‘virus’ only attacked the fittest and turned their immune systems in on themselves. They use the Nova Scotia study which dug up permafrosted victims and ‘recreated the virus’ and then injected it into monkey brains which stuffed their immunes systems as justification for this Hans Christian Anderson account.

Many things wrong with this modelling, you can’t do histology on a corpse it’s all jet trash, ‘recreating virus’ is out of Jurassic park and even if it was true, and it isnt, there was no control. If they had taken cellular detritus from a non victim and injected it into monkey brains and shown no effect by comparison they might be able to prove something but they didn’t.

Contagen mythology doesn’t tell us that we ‘catch’ flu from a brain injection so the route of transmission had nothing to do with their own theory, when you consider that childs spit injected into an adult can kill it from immune responses to foreign proteins one wonders how on earth anyone with a scientific mind got it together to even attempt to publish this crap.

“Aspirin misuse may have made 1918 flu pandemic worse
October 2, 2009

The devastation of the 1918-1919 influenza pandemic is well known, but a new article suggests a surprising factor in the high death toll: the misuse of aspirin. Appearing in the November 1 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases and available online now, the article sounds a cautionary note as present day concerns about the novel H1N1 virus run high.

High aspirin dosing levels used to treat patients during the 1918-1919 pandemic are now known to cause, in some cases, toxicity and a dangerous build up of fluid in the lungs, which may have contributed to the incidence and severity of symptoms, bacterial infections, and mortality. Additionally, autopsy reports from 1918 are consistent with what we know today about the dangers of aspirin toxicity, as well as the expected viral causes of death.

The motivation behind the improper use of aspirin is a cautionary tale, said author Karen Starko, MD. In 1918, physicians did not fully understand either the dosing or pharmacology of aspirin, yet they were willing to recommend it. Its use was promoted by the drug industry, endorsed by doctors wanting to “do something,” and accepted by families and institutions desperate for hope. ”

On a final note on this the newspapers of the time were full of accounts of osteopaths having a .25% mortality rate over the massively higher ones in medical hospitals that used between 5 and 35grams of aspirin the first drug to be licensed to Bayer. MDs were calling for more osteopaths who left the fever high, didnt use aspirin, fasted the patients and gave an enema when constipated. They called it 3 or 4 day flu and most recovered. The new NICE guidelines on fever do not recommend reducing fever now but most doctors have no idea why and usually ignore this.

Postmen at the time noticed that all the patients who ordered aspirin were dead by the following day and those who ordered homeopathic remedies survived, which is interesting and likely to get me banned from posting here or suspended if Daddy gets to hear of it.

The recent ‘pandemic saga’ probably had a negligable mortality rate because most people ignored CDC and NIH advice to get a vaccine or take antivirals so really the moral of this tale is to totally ignore any government or centralised advice on any health matter and do the opposite!

For anyone who is reading these comments, Sarah is a germ theory denialist. Every one of sarah’s arguments can be easily demolished, but it would be time-consuming and wouldn’t change her mind. If any reader thinks Sarah has a single valid point, please let us know and we will explain why she is wrong.

Chris the article on mercury states quite clearly that ethyl mercury has no long term toxicity studies so what is an unproven ingredient doing in a vaccine and what evidence do you have that it has been taken out of multivial pediatric vaccines?

What article are you talking about? There is more than one under discussion.

My evidence is here, and in the following Autism/Mercury Yahoo message by Sallie Bernard requesting “old DTaP” vaccines with thimerosal in 2001, which means you really should get over it:

A group of university-based researchers needs several vials of the older DTaP vaccine formulations which contained thimerosal for a legitimate research study. If anyone knows an MD who might have some of these vaccines or knows where to get them, please email me privately.